Trainings

We delievr short and concise trainings

"The seven habits of successfull bidders"

Bidding for grants and contracts is complex for a development organization or socially responsive company. 

Those who lack bidding experience or know-how may actually lose out and miss projects and contracts thast they could and should have won. In 90% of the cases this is due to unawareness of the classic pitfalls at stake and of the ways to easily avoid these. Are you sufficiently familiar with bidding processes in calls for proposals and tenders at the different international donors?  

We give you a helicopter view of the international bidding scene - with practical examples and case studies. We share our insights with you on the reasons why certain bidders are structurally more successful than others - and what the real pitfalls are.

There are structural habits behind success and failure at bid writing. Successful bidders chose their calls and tenders strategically. But they are also complete, structured, client-centred and to-the-point. They manage to discover the real needs and aspirations behind the call or tender - and they dare to trigger these. They also dare to be distinct and arise expectations. They base their bids on their strengths and cover their weaknesses with smart partnerships. The strategically play into what drives the donor. They profile themselves well but also know how to deliver. However, above all, they know how donors make their decisions - and structure their proposals and bid in such a way that it is easy on them to take the right decisions quickly and justify them properly.

"E-smart: slim electronisch inschrijven"

More and more tenders and calls are dealt with through electronic platforms. One of them is CTM (Complete Tender Management) - the market leader in this field in the Netherlands. You may benefit from their knowledge on electronic procurement. These calls and tenders often have shorter deadlines and quite specific requirements. Successful bidders also need a bit of skills to deal with the on-line forms and signing procedures.

Together with CTM Solution we train you to become e-smart: to deal in the most effective manner with the electronic call-for-proposal and tender platforms. This will reduce your efficiency, deminish the irritating mistakes in the bidding documents and avoid the breathtaking last-minute deadline stress.  

"International donors as happy clients"

Many organizations and companies would love to bid more for calls and tenders but shy away from having international donors as clients. In this training we will deal with all the prejudices and worst experiences: they are thought to pay badly, to have excessive demands, to break their promises, to come up with new requirements and procedures all the time, to be over-bureaucratic and occupy themselves with procedures .... just to mention a few. It is all true - if you want to see it like that.

Still, international donors are also very predictable as clients. Their grants and contracts have a long or mid-term duration. The margins may not always be so great but still they allow your organization and company to be fully operational during the project or contract. It is a steady and reliable cash flow. And it almost always comes with spin-offs: new contracts and clients emanating from the donor grant or contract. They also force us to review our quality and accountability systems and procedures thoroughly, every now and then.

In this training we assist you to make a detailed client profile of the international donors that are relevant to your organization or company. We turn them into people of flesh and bones, so to say, so that they become recognizable to you - as your target group. We confront you with those things that keep international donors really awake at night. Most of this is related to prevent the risk of failure and the care for compliance and accountability. They are the guardians of out tax payers' money, after all - and are held accountable publicly.

With this donor client profile we assist you to come up with the right and potentially successful marketing strategies. 

"How to put a bid writing desk in place?"

It is really just a regular organizational function: the sales department for international donor clients. As international donors virtually only give grants through calls for proposals and only award contracts through tenders, it pays of to put a bid writing desk in place - a team of dedicated staff who tracks which calls and tenders come out, picks out the ones at which you really stand a good chance and then takes care that concept notes, full proposals, expressions of interests and/or bids are well composed and submitted according to the instructions.

In this training we help you to assess how your sales department functions for international donor clients - how you find leads, how you decide which leads to go for and how you subsequently convert these leads into prospects and clients. 

When bidding for calls for proposals and tenders it is of utmost importance to quickly decide on your chances for success. We offer you a quick scan tool that has already assisted a lot of other organizations and companies in their decision making. Further we discuss how to make a bid plan, following the bid writer's work flow and project team management. Often it is possible to work with generic folders that you can draw information from: CVs, track record, organizational charts, legal documents, referance projects, quality manuals and certificates and so on. It is further our experience that a clear mandate, strict deadline management and tight process steering are important for effective bid writing desks.

We will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing part of your bid writing desks  and assist you to make a choice in this, especially also in the light of the contract management that you will contractually have to put in place in case you win the call or tender. Before you leave we will assist you to make an action plan for your bid writing desk, and if need be, contract management routines as well. 

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Would you like to know more and gain quick insights into successful bid writing?

Exclusively for our clients we organise such trainings, at the cost of € 960 (ex VAT) per person, in which your staff is taken through a one-day master class and upgrades his or her skills to apply for calls for proposals or bid for international donor contracts. The training costs include hand-outs and catering. After the training our experts always offer you and your staff a drink and remain readily available for further consultation.

If you contact us through the contact form, we can give you an overview of the scheduled trainings and venues for the coming year.

We can also stage these trainings in-house or in-company and/or follow them up with intensive coaching and mentoring of your staff. Does this call your attention? Please contact us through the contact form then, so we can discuss the possibilities.